People don’t rely only on search engines to find expertise anymore. AI tools like ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google’s AI Overviews now pull in answers directly from trusted sources. This means your site needs to be clear, authoritative, and easy for both humans and AI systems to trust and quote.
As a new guide from Allegiance Group + Pursuant puts it, “AI is changing how information gets discovered. Your goal should be to create content that gets referenced.”
Here’s how to start, one page or section at a time:
- Lead with the answer
Open each page with a clear, direct answer or summary. Avoid the warm-up paragraph. Those first few sentences should stand on their own as the answer someone’s looking for. If your intro meanders, AI (and readers) may never reach the good part. - Make every section a mini-answer
Most AI tools pull from specific chunks, not whole pages. This ideally means treating each subhead as its own Q&A unit, clear enough to stand alone. Headings that echo real questions (“How do I apply?” “What happens if I’m denied?”) help both AI and people instantly see what the section covers. You don’t have to rewrite every heading today—start with your most-visited or most important pages. - Keep it current and credible
Fresh, accurate pages get cited more often. Add a visible “last updated” date, cite trustworthy data, and refresh your key pages regularly. Even a light annual review helps signal that your organization is active and informed. - Show your real expertise
AI gives extra weight to identifiable, credible experts. Include bylines, staff titles, or even quotes from your team. Add organizational context or short bios where relevant. Anything that shows real humans with real experience behind the content. - Turn downloads into web content
AI tools aren’t likely to read your PDFs (just like your readers on mobile phones). Post the information, or at least summaries, of your key reports on the page itself. You’ll make your best material more discoverable and more useful. - Cross-link related topics
Internal links help readers and AI understand how your site fits together. Connecting pages like “Applying for benefits” and “Appealing a denial” builds a visible network of expertise. Small updates here and there add up over time. - Write like a human
Clear, natural language helps AI understand you and your readers trust you. Skip the jargon, write conversationally, and focus on being genuinely helpful. The more your content sounds like something a smart, kind person would say, the more it gets shared, cited, and remembered.
You don’t need a full overhaul. Keep refining pages little by little. Make your content clear, current, and confidently human. Those same qualities that make your writing easy and helpful for readers also make it more likely to be discovered (and quoted) by AI.
Over time, these small steps build a strong foundation for both visibility and trust.
Dive Deeper
AI/LLM Content Optimization Guide | Allegiance Group + Pursuant
A practical guide explaining how AI tools read your content, and providing guidelines to create citable, AI-optimized content that maintains the standards your audience deserves.
Keep your website traffic up in an AI-first search world | NTEN
For many information-rich sites, optimizing for AI means that people get answers directly from the AI tools, without ever coming to your site. What does that mean? How do you think about and measure your success? This great article takes on these thorny questions.
Mastering website content strategy for AI-powered search (complete guide) | LightFlows
A broader overview of content strategy for the reality of AI search—useful for setting your plan over time, not just rapid fixes.